STANFORD, Calif. – In the baseball movie ‘For Love of the Game,’ Kevin Costner’s character would say in his mind “clear the mechanism” to shift his focus and block out all the outside noise in order to make his next pitch. Stanford men’s volleyball coach John Kosty is training his players to have the same level of focus.
Kosty has been using sports psychology in his program since 2009 and recently came across a way to help train his players to focus better. Each of the players have a headset that monitors brain activity as you are in a focused state. It looks at your alpha, beta and theta waves, taking the information and projecting it into a game. Kosty has taken the results from each session and compared them to see if the team is improving their focus.
“The hard part in the past was there was no measurable way to see if our sports psychology training was working,” said Kosty. “With all sports you want to have something measurable for how you are doing.”
For the last several months the team has been using the headsets for 20 minutes at the start of practice two or three times a week. The results are recorded and monitored in order to see improvements for each individual.
“We pick a couple of days that are more stressful days,” said Kosty. “It allows them to clear their minds and truly leave everything at the door so they have a blank slate heading into practice.”
There are two aspects to it. One monitors your focus and the other your stress. The different games available cater to each of those two and include neuro shapes, trying to make a free throw, attempting to keep a balloon or glider in the air and driving a car on a race track.
“It has proved to be pretty effective with our team,” said senior libero Grant Delgado. “We notice it in practice when we are doing longer drills and are able to maintain a good level of focus throughout. You start to get to know the feeling of what it is like to be in the focused mindset and it becomes easier over time.”
The positive results of the focus training have not been limited to the players’ focus on the court. The student-athletes have also used it outside of volleyball to help with school work and other stresses in life.
“It is something that helps us when playing volleyball, but is also something we can utilize the rest of our lives,” said Delgado. “It gets us to focus better on the task at hand. It has gotten me to think differently about focusing for everything in my life in general.”
Some student-athletes use the headsets right when they wake up in the morning to get in a focused state to start the day, while others use them before going to sleep so they have a clear mind and can sleep better through the night.
“Stanford offers so much for student-athletes and this gives them the ability to stay focused on a single task,” said Kosty. “We let them try to decide what is best for them and their needs.”
The benefits have extended to Kosty and his coaching staff. The outside distractions for a coach in any certain game may include a recruit being on campus, making sure team travel plans are set or if the food will be ready after a match. Kosty has been able to switch away from those thoughts and have 100 percent of his focus on game situations.
“As coaches we utilize it before matches, going in with a nice centered state and being calm,” said Kosty. “We can make those crunch-time decisions without thinking about all of those things tugging at you before the match.”
The feedback of the focus training has been extremely positive and the results have shown improvements in focus.
“Our student-athletes have been able to have the ability to get better at it and have the data to show they are getting better at it,” said Kosty. “Our guys are highly competitive and every time we do it they compete against each other to continue to get better. It has been a really valuable asset to our program.”
